Poor Slave
by reluctantfangirl213
Summary: A brief glimpse into Eleanor Guthrie and Charles Vane's pasts, including first sightings and their first kiss. A one-shot written for VaneEleanor Appreciation Week. In my head their age-gap is roughly 9-10 years...I guess I'm a sucker for a good age difference.


The first time that Charles Vane saw Eleanor Guthrie she was just an impish child-maybe five-years-old, six at the most. A newly arrived, teenage deckhand in Nassau, he was completely overwhelmed by the vibrant, noisy chaos in front of him. The only scene that stood out was the giggling yellow-haired girl terrorizing a young black man who was hopelessly trying to contain her. _Thank goodness she isn't my problem. Poor slave._ He knew all too well what it felt like to have a demanding master, but he'd never had a master who was quite so...adorable. He felt his lips quirk into a smile-a fairly new expression for him-as the girl gleefully stomped her keeper's foot and took off into the crowd of men.

Years later, whenever they talked about their past, he always said that the first time he saw her was when she was about thirteen. He didn't want to alarm her with how long she'd preoccupied him. To be fair, he'd almost forgotten about that first glimpse altogether. The memory had crashed into him one day-maybe the fifth time he saw her, not that he was counting-as he'd watched a teenaged Eleanor performing a similar maneuver to get away from the man he now knew as Mr. Scott.

The second time he saw her-the memory he always told her about-he was sitting on the beach, reveling in his new status as captain. A murmur of appreciation from his men directed his attention to the sight of a barefoot girl walking boldly through the camps. Sunlight glinted off of her hair and Charles knew she had to be Richard Guthrie's daughter. He'd heard tales of her stubbornness and refusal to obey either her father or Mr. Scott, but until now he hadn't seen her.

She stopped maybe fifty yards from where he was sitting and stepped towards the water to let the waves rush against her ankles. She seemed relieved. Charles tried to pretend that he wasn't admiring how her golden hair and red dress cut a striking figure against the blue backdrop of the sea. _Eleanor_ , he remembered. That was her name. Eleanor was swaying slightly and seemed utterly at ease despite the audience of vigilant, hungry men surrounding her.

Someone catcalled and he expected her to bolt, but she just rolled her eyes as she glanced over he shoulder. Those eyes landed on him, taking in what he knew was him staring. Surely she'd bolt now-his reputation was not a gentle one. Instead she fucking smiled at him. _Is she not afraid?_ He was incredulous. It was a small, smug smile at first, but as soon as his expression betrayed his shock at her audacity, it turned into a full-blown grin. He glowered at her.

One of his men started to stand and he heard himself growl, "Don't fucking move." The words were unbidden, but there was no way anyone was touching her. From his crew or otherwise.

Eleanor was still watching them and still smirking. Turning back the way she came, she hiked her skirts nearly to the knee and walked deeper into the water. He thought he could hear an echo of a man's exasperated voice calling her name, but he couldn't look away from her to see if it was Mr. Scott or some other harried guardian.

"I pity the man who tries to tame that one," cackled another one of his men.

 _I don't._

—

Eleanor always told Charles that she'd never noticed him until that first time he talked to her. Claimed she hadn't realized he was the pirate she'd smirked at on the beach in her youthful arrogance. Of course, that was a lie.

Rumors about an unusually young, up-and-coming pirate lord reached her ears when she was barely eleven. Within two years, when Charles Vane became captain of _The Ranger_ before he was 30, she made it a point to figure out who this man was. She spied on her father the day that Captain Vane came to trade with him for the first time. The memory of his flashing blue eyes, rasping voice, and arrogant smirk made her stomach flip and visited her mind at the most inopportune times. Against her will, Charles Vane had become her first infatuation.

She'd actually been seeking him out only a few days later on the beach. Catching him staring had more than pleased her, but Charles didn't know that. She always scoffed at him when he reminisced about that moment, but she spent more than her share of time wondering whether she'd imagined him stopping one of his men from approaching her.

Charles couldn't begin to guess how many of their other "accidental" run-ins she'd orchestrated.

—

It wasn't until maybe the fiftieth-again, he wasn't counting- time that he saw her that he got to talk to her. Casual asking around during his last time in port had informed him that Eleanor was now sixteen. He hadn't seen her since he arrived this time, but he refused to admit that he'd been looking for her the entire day. Finally resigning himself to the fact that he wasn't going to see her tonight, he all but stormed out of the tavern-crashing straight into an instantly incensed blond fury. _Eleanor._ He barely caught her before she tripped backwards over the door frame.

He couldn't stop himself from saying (with a little too much relief), "Miss Guthrie!" He only hoped she didn't wonder how he knew her name.

Her eyebrows arched as she shrugged his hands off her shoulders. "Captain Vane, right? Leaving so soon?"

He had intended to leave, but somehow ended up following her back into the tavern and allowing her to serve him another drink. She bent far too close to him as she poured his rum and he was assailed by her scent. She smelled like the most intoxicating mixture of salty ocean and spicy rum. He was in a daze as he poured way too many coins on the table for one serving of rum. In another display of smooth ladykilling skills, he also managed to drop half of them on the floor.

Eleanor quickly bent to scoop up the coins and pocketed every single one of them. On her way back to a standing position, without warning, she brushed her lips across the corner of his mouth. Few things could catch Captain Charles Vane off guard, but he never saw it coming. He wasn't even sure if it really happened or if he was fantasizing again.

A minxish smile lit her face and she murmured, "Thank you for your generosity." With that she walked away without another word.

That was the moment Charles Vane realized how royally fucked he was when it came to Eleanor Guthrie. He was what he'd hoped to never be again. _Poor slave._


End file.
